


The Mark of Cain

by greygerbil



Category: Vampyr (Video Game)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-24
Updated: 2018-11-24
Packaged: 2019-08-28 12:53:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16723794
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/greygerbil/pseuds/greygerbil
Summary: After the fight at Stonebridge Cemetery, a distraught Jonathan makes his way to the only place where he thinks he might find comfort after what he's done: the East End night asylum.





	The Mark of Cain

**Author's Note:**

> I did not check this as Major Character Death because this death is canon in the game and doesn't happen in the fic proper, but discussing the death is still a major part of the fic, so if you don't want to read that, it'd be best to click out. Also, if you haven't finished Chapter 3 of the game yet, big spoilers ahead.

The rain came down cold and hard and wind tore like claws at Sean as he made his rounds through the court yard of his night asylum. Walking past the tents, which snapped and crackled in the squalls, he saw not a single soul, which didn’t surprise him. In weather like this, most of his flock hurried inside without a reminder to do so. He opened the flap of a closed tent to check on Martha, who was usually languishing there, barely unable to overcome her chronic melancholy long enough to move, sick in spirit if not in body. Apparently, the other residents had brought her inside already, which was a relief.

Turning to face the wind and lowering his head against the onslaught of rain, he checked first the left and then the right side of the building, too. There were no tents here, but some people searching for the peace of the shelter didn’t want to or weren’t yet ready to face him, but needed the protection, anyway. Sean allowed them to stay, of course, tried to talk to them but didn’t push them. However, with weather such as this, he needed to at least attempt to convince them to come inside.

He found no one huddling against the side of the building and was just about to turn away when he saw an oddly-shaped shadow sitting on a wooden perch jutting out from an adjacent house, which hung slightly over the shelter’s fence. Looking closer, he felt his heart seize up as he recognised the form to be that of a man. This place was not high up enough for someone to fling themselves to their death, was it? No, he hoped not. But how had they even got up? Though his eyes were attuned to the night now, he didn’t see a ladder, or the shape of a window in the wall behind.

“Good evening, sir!” he tried, shouting against the wind. “Do you need any help?”

“You have sharp eyes, Sean,” came the answer, so quiet he had to strain to hear.

“Dr. Reid?”

The man said nothing. Sean hesitated. Part of him wanted to turn around and leave him to whatever it was he was doing, the one that still quivered, balked, and yet clung with sick fascination to the moment when he had sunk to his knees before Reid. He remembered the time Reid had come back to ask him how he was, how reflexively he had shot down his request to listen to his heart, half out of fear, half because he realised that Reid would find it racing if he put his hands on Sean.

However, he immediately scolded himself for the unkind, selfish thought of abandoning Reid. Much like those people skulking about the shelter walls sometimes, Reid might be wounded in some way. Why else would he have been here, sitting in the storm at the edge of the asylum? Sean could tell now, after years of doing this job, when someone hesitated because they were ashamed, angry, or thought themselves beyond help, yet still secretly hoped for another soul to take a step towards them. And though Reid had been harsh with Sean, hadn’t he helped him, too? He might owe this man his life, or what was left of it, anyway.

Sean glanced at the platform Reid was sitting on. There was some empty space by his side. A vampire of Reid’s talents could easily get up there, but what about Sean? He was no fighter, he did not exercise his newfound powers much. Still, he could try for Reid’s sake.

Taking a deep breath, Sean focused in on that empty spot and then let all his muscles grow tense before he jumped. The movement was too fast to think about, and he realised by the pain exploding in his shins as they rammed into the side of the platform that he had misjudged the height. His knees were on the surface, though, and he gracelessly scrambled for an iron bar that hung overhead to make sure he stayed on it. The hand that wrapped tightly around his arm and pulled him forward helped, too.

“Now, careful!” Reid said, letting go.

Sean turned and looked at the tall figure before him up close. There was a great amount of dirt all over Reid’s coat and suit, made muddy by the rain. His arms and legs looked like they’d been buried, they were so stained and full of earth.

“What happened to you, Dr. Reid?” Sean asked, swallowing his own surprise to keep his voice calm.

Reid lowered his eyes.

“I solved the case of the dead body in your yard. You won’t have to worry about your flock anymore.” He stopped himself, gave a wry smile. “Well, I won’t go that far. This is still the East End, so I suppose they’ll give you as many reasons to worry as this storm has clouds. That particular murderer won’t come around here anymore, though.”

“I’m very grateful,” Sean said, honestly. Still, it did little to explain the far-away, desperate look in Reid’s eyes, or the dirt he was covered in. “Did you get hurt?”

Reid ran a hand over his own face, leaving a smear of mud across his nose.

“Not as badly as I deserved to be.”

The wind rattled the tiles on the roof behind them. Sean shivered, not sure himself if at the cold or the certainty in Reid’s words.

“I’m sure you don’t deserve to be hurt at all, Dr. Reid. You have always been helpful to people here and at Pembroke, from all I’ve heard. What would make you think so?”

“Tell me, Sean, what was Cain’s punishment for slaying Abel again? I confess it has been a while since I’ve read Genesis.”

Before, Sean had sometimes found Reid’s strict adherence to reason that left so little room for faith vexing, but right now he would have much preferred it to these choppy, not all the way coherent answers he was getting instead.

“I – well, I won’t mind telling you, but maybe we can go inside first. It’s awfully cold and you look soaked to the bone.”

“I can’t get sick.”

“But it’s still not pleasant,” Sean insisted, gently.

Reid gave him a long look and finally nodded his head. When he jumped into the court, it was faster than the blink of an eye. Sean still had to collect his courage for a moment to follow, stumbling as he landed. Reid watched him silently and Sean felt clumsy under his blank gaze.

Through the front doors, Sean led Reid to the back room he had claimed for himself and all the essential stock he didn’t dare leave out in the open.

“You can clean your face and your hands at the sink,” he told Reid, who stood motionless in the middle of the room like he’d forgotten how he’d gotten there.

Reid nodded his head and Sean stripped his wet jacket before he walked over to his personal drawer, where he pulled out trousers, socks, and a shirt, the widest he had. He heard the water run and splash behind him, then the squeal of the old tap.

“I’m not sure if my clothes will fit you too well. You are quite a bit taller,” he said. “But they should do while yours hang to dry.”

“I didn’t mean to impose on you this much,” Reid muttered, shaking his hands dry over the sink. “I shouldn’t have come at all. It’s best if I go.”

“It’s absolutely fine, Doctor. Besides, now you’re already here,” Sean said, placing the clothes on the table before he turned away. He wouldn’t force Reid, and in fact probably couldn’t if he’d tried, considering their difference in strength, but even being the powerful Ekon he was, Sean would have hated to let Reid go again. Sean could feel his unsteadiness and confusion and with so many dangerous things wandering the streets these nights, walking across London without one’s full attention focused on the way could prove to be a deadly undertaking. Besides, this was the place for people to come if they were troubled.

There was a long silence until he finally heard the quiet whisper of fabric. Sean busied himself with an order list for the pharmacy to give Reid some time to change clothes. When he looked back, he saw that the hem of the trousers and sleeves cut off far too high on Reid’s long limbs, and the shirt was pulled taut over his chest. Not perfect, but it would do.

“Now… you asked about Cain,” Sean said, carefully, when Reid didn’t speak.

“Yes.”

Reid fell down on a chair and Sean pulled up another one to face him.

“Cain was a farmer, so God made the earth reject his hands’ work after he’d killed Abel, which forced him to take up a wandering life. The Lord also gave him a mark so that whoever would try to kill him would know that they in turn would be hurt sevenfold. This protected Cain from being murdered, which gave him time to repent his sins.”

“Was he not rather given the mark to shame him in the eyes of all men as he had to walk the earth?” Reid asked quietly.

Sean cocked his head.

“I know not the will of God and I have heard that interpretation, too… but I believe in the other one.”

Reid looked at him for a long moment.

“I killed my sister,” he said.

Though in this district, where murder was distressingly commonplace, Reid’s confession of a killing was not the first he had received, Sean still found himself tongue-tied. Before he had a chance to pick the right answer or question, Reid continued: “Or should I say I killed her again? I have done it twice now.” He barked a humourless laugh, fear bright in his eyes. “This has to be a nightmare. It just must be!”

“I’m so sorry, but I… I don’t follow.”

Reid rubbed his forehead with his knuckles.

“When I clambered out of the mass grave I had been thrown into after my Maker got to me, I was… I was barely a thinking creature. The first beating heart I saw, I jumped at, like a beast. It was only once I had the blood in me that I saw I had killed my own sister. The poor woman was looking for me.” Slowly, he lowered his hand. “But it seems when I cradled her against me, my neck being bitten bloody… she must have gotten some on her lips. I didn’t know how vampires were made, then, I…” He looked at the wall. “She was rabid, Sean. She was killing innocents just to put me on her trail so she could make me fight her. Losing her husband and son and then what I did to her – I think it was too much. The first time I killed her, she asked me to stop. The second time, she begged me to do it. I had to put her out of her misery, a misery which was entirely my fault.” He glanced at the dirt-stained clothes that laid crumpled on the ground. “I buried her again. I’d give everything to be sure she found her peace this time.”

When he was done talking, Reid sank deeper in to the chair as if with the words, all his remaining will had passed out of his body. Sean only realised he had been grabbing his cross as he felt its edges dig sharply into the flesh of his palm.

“Your sister is with God now,” he said quietly. “I understand you must be in a lot of pain, though. There are no words for what you went through.”

Reid shook his head.

“It seems very petty to complain about _my_ pain when she’s the one who is dead!”

“Her suffering was great, I am certain, but it does not mean you cannot suffer also. Unfortunately, pain is not finite, and how much anguish we feel does not scale with the pain of others.”

In this very asylum, he had people who were, if one was honest, almost entirely at fault for their own problems, and those who had done nothing in their life to deserve them; some who only needed a roof over their head for a night or two before clawing their way back up on their own accord, and some firmly stuck at the bottom of the hole. Judging them as deserving of attention along those lines or any others should not be the work of a man such as him, Sean was convinced. Everyone was worthy of compassion, at the very least. This was true even for a man like William Bishop, and there was little reason to deny it to one such as Reid. All the calamity in his life seemed to come primarily from blind misfortune.

Reid’s gaze drifted over the ceiling as he contemplated Sean’s words.

“I just want my sister back, Sean. I want it to be four years ago,” he answered, voice hollow.

“I understand.”

Sean touched Reid’s arm and found himself dragged into a crushing hug. It was rough and unexpected and he went rigid for a moment, all the emotions that had nothing to do with a man asking for his comfort rushing back in and threatening to overwhelm him, mixing with flight instincts formed of the old and ugly memories that had always made him a bit skittish at such sudden contact. However, when Reid’s head sagged against his shoulder, the turmoil went away to make room for pity, and Sean put his arms around him. Reid cried very quietly, but he could feel him shaking.

“I got blood on your shirt,” Reid muttered, as he finally leaned back. He looked dangerous with the tracks of bloody tears on his face. Sean was not afraid of him, though. At least not of being hurt by him. Reid’s power over him was of a different kind.

“It’s fine. Don’t worry about it. It’s almost daylight out, maybe you should try to sleep. I imagine you fought hard.”

Reluctantly, Reid nodded his head. Sean gestured at him to follow and brought him through a door to his own little bedstead. Though he believed Reid was in no danger of turning wolf among his flock, it was clear he needed some room for himself, and with how much he involved himself in the lives and problems of others – a trait Sean found very charming –, he would just end up being kept awake.

“I will be right here if you need me, Dr. Reid,” he said.

When he’d closed the door, he leaned his back against it and said a prayer for Mary, and for Dr. Reid, and then a short one for himself, asking the Lord to forgive his foolish feelings.

-

Waking had been different since he’d turned, Jonathan had noticed. It used to be that there was a grace period of blissful ignorance when reality seemed far away. He had relished these few seconds of peace during the war. As a vampire, his mind engaged more quickly. Now, as he opened his eyes, Mary’s bruised face was right at the forefront and he could still smell the wet earth of the grave. He did not try to chase the memories away. She was his sister and deserved at least not to be pushed out of his head.

As he turned away from the naked brick wall and saw the sparse, unfamiliar furnishings and the bible lying on the ground next to the mattress, he realised that he had not fallen asleep in his own bed at Pembroke. While Mary’s death was as clear as if it had happened just a minute ago, he could not quite piece together where he was or how he had ended up here. After he’d spent an hour digging debris and mud out of Mary’s grave with a splintered plank of a casket lid, every limb hurting from the fight, he had placed Mary in the hole, broken-hearted, filled it up again and then…

He had headed for the night asylum. It must have seemed like a good idea at the time. The place in London to go if you were lost and needed comfort when you did not deserve it, led by a man who had mourned the life of the raving monster that had sucked him dry the first time Jonathan had met him. He had been fond of Sean since that night, even as he grew understandably a little distant with Jonathan after he had thrown the greatest tragedies of his life into Sean’s face to break him into submission. Still, it was no surprise at all that he had run for him.

The images and conversations from last night came back quicker now, especially as he looked down to find himself still in Sean’s too-small clothing, and Jonathan all but flinched at them.

Quickly, he got to his feet. A cheap pocket watch on a drawer told him he had likely slept through the day until eight the next evening. As he opened the door to Sean’s office, he found him sitting at his table fixing the seam of a shirt. Jonathan’s clothes were draped over the cast iron radiator, his shoes squeezed under it. Sean looked up at the sound of his footsteps and put needle and thread to the side.

“Dr. Reid. I hope you feel a little better, in body, at least.”

“I do,” he said. “Thank you, Sean. You were very kind to me last night. I hope I didn’t frighten you. This was not how I had hoped to meet again.”

“Don’t worry at all. What happened to you and your sister is truly awful.”

“Yes,” Jonathan said, solemnly. “But it is not your burden to carry.”

“You have a lot of weight already on your shoulders. I don’t mind sharing some of it.”

“And you don’t?” Jonathan asked, glancing at the door to the asylum proper.

“I don’t consider this a hardship, nor was helping you.”

You could imagine how he’d gotten his saintly nickname, Jonathan thought, as he carefully sat down on a chair to look at Sean again, like he had last night.

“I should apologise, anyway,” he said, after clearing his throat. “Making you my confessor was one thing, but I should not have been so, ah, physical. I know we are not on the best terms right now.”

“Why would you think that?” Sean asked.

“There’s no need to spare my sensibilities, Sean. What I did to get you to listen was not kind, and drinking my blood made you uncomfortable. You said so yourself.”

“I... yes, something like that, but – it does not mean I dislike you, Dr. Reid.”

Sean looked off to the side. He was not a good liar, Jonathan realised in that moment. And why would he be? He needn’t do it much, since his believes were so steadfast and true. Sean apparently bore him no ill will, he believed that much, but obviously there was something he was hiding.

“Is everything alright? I should be the one embarrassed, if anything.”

“No,” Sean said, some energy back in his voice, “you shouldn’t be. You were in shock. That’s what you told me after you saved me at William Bishop’s place, wasn’t it?”

Jonathan was surprised to find himself thus diagnosed by his former patient, and accurately, too, by all accounts. It was strange to think that after a war and the terrible chaos of these lasts weeks, there was still something that could truly put him back in that dark place beyond clear thought. But if anything could, of course it would be the horror his Mary had had to endure.

“You may be right,” he said, with a lopsided smile. “And they call _me_ a doctor.”

Sean lowered his gaze.

“I am not one, but I think it’s very hard to diagnose oneself. For example, I think – you were right about me having to drink the blood, even if I did not know it then.”

“I’m relieved you see it that way.” Jonathan halted. “But then, may I ask why you were so against being examined by me? Not that you’re obligated to let me do that, I just thought...”

Again, Sean halted and played with the ripped shirt in his hands.

“The bite was very intense. But – you should not think about it. It’s not the sort of thing I would bother you with right now. In fact, I’d rather not speak about it at all.”

Jonathan could hear his heart beating faster and things clicked into place in his head: the twisted intimacy which he had felt as Sean sucked at his wrist, how Sean had rejected Jonathan’s touch with for him unusual vehemence, Sean’s stammering confession that he did not dislike him.

He may have sparked something far more complicated in Sean’s head than just resentment; and it was made so much worse by the fact that Jonathan was immediately tempted by it.

“Dr. Reid,” Sean said into the silence. “Now that you have recovered somewhat, I’m not sure this still means something to you as a man of science, but Cain went on to have a wife and a son and build a city. You did not slay your sister out of jealousy or spite, so you are already far above him. I think you are an honourable man and you will prove it and do good if you just set your mind to it, which I know you can.”

“No, that means a lot,” Jonathan said, honestly. Perhaps he was not a great believer, but Sean was, and his judgement was worth much to Jonathan while God’s seemed abstract and far away. Jonathan knew Sean would have found that thought blasphemous, so he did not say it out loud. However, Sean’s verdict was something to hold on to next to his sister’s words. Jonathan took a deep breath. “Mary said she would forgive me if I can find a cure for this plague. That’s what I must do. For her, and for this city.”

Sean nodded his head.

“If there is any help I can provide you at all, don’t hesitate to ask. I promise I won’t turn you down anymore.”

“You have helped enough for now, Sean,” Jonathan said. “But to know I am welcome here would provide me some peace of mind.”

“Always.”

Perhaps his mind was still weakened by last night’s events, or it was just the affection that rushed through him in that moment, but Jonathan found himself reaching out, covering Sean’s hand lying on the table with his own.

“Thank you,” he said.

Sean stared at him, but he did not pull his hand back. It turned, after long second, to squeeze Jonathan’s fingers timidly. Jonathan leaned forward and kissed his cheek, cold and scruffy with beard as it was. 

Though it was just a cursory brush and Sean leaned back quickly, he looked as pleased as he did flustered, and Jonathan smiled. Regrets to teach him the gravity of his mistakes, and a flicker of hope to keep him from succumbing to despair. Mary and Sean. They would be his guiding stars from here on out.


End file.
